


Best of Buds

by provocation



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: F/M, First Kiss, Gift Exchange, Gift Fic, M/M, Multi, Polyamory, Reunions, also features Leia and Luke as minor characters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-30
Updated: 2016-03-30
Packaged: 2018-05-30 01:53:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,437
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6403822
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/provocation/pseuds/provocation
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rey returns to the base after training with Luke; Finn and Poe have missed her dearly.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Best of Buds

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Val_Creative](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Val_Creative/gifts).



When Finn first stumbles into the garden, he’s certain he’s accidentally made his way into another dimension, and has to glance behind himself to check for a portal or something. Sure enough, the unassuming door he’d accidentally walked through remains an unassuming door, dingy and rusted. He purses his lips, and then turns around to take in the garden again.

It’s hard to pick out his favourite thing about the lush, hidden conservatory. The high ceiling is slanted glass, and it allows the Ileenium sunlight to filter through freely. Ivy plants crawl up the walls, flowering in little bursts of white and pink. On the ground are even more flowers, of many different genera that Finn wouldn’t be able to name correctly if he had to. Tiny insects buzz back and forth between bushes, and Finn hears a low chirping that  _must_  be from a bird somewhere, although that doesn’t seem quite possible.

In short, he has stumbled into the opposite of Jakku.

A figure bent over a shrub shifts, and Finn’s eyes are instantly drawn to them. He hadn’t noticed them in the midst of all the other wonders, and he realizes with a shock who exactly is kneeling in the shrubbery.

Finn hastens to straighten up, and nods to the figure, hailing, “Hello, General.”

Leia turns to Finn, and a slow smile dawns over her features. “Finn!” The General pushes herself up to her feet, dusting off her gardening gloves. She looks the least militial that he has ever seen her, devoid of her regalia and the usual frown lines etched into her face. “How have you been keeping yourself?”

“Busy,” Finn answers, confused. “General, have I somehow ended up outside the base?”

Leia’s smile widens, and she beckons him over. “You like it? It reminds me of Naboo most, I think. Or a fairy-tale, perhaps.” Finn takes a tentative step off of the door frame, and sees a path of stones in the dirt that he could have easily missed. He follows the path to Leia, careful not to step on any part of her pet project. She pulls off the gloves she’s wearing with her teeth, and then holds them in one hand, crossing her arms.

“I like it,” he replies easily, because he does. He feels enchanted by the garden’s very existence; something to nurture the soul tucked into the back hallways of a military base. On paper, this place is a waste of supplies. Captain Phasma would have hated it, which makes him like it all the more. “Did you plant all this yourself?”

“Stars, no,” she laughs. “It started out as an affordable way to try to grow food in the base, but we discovered some wild fields that only required some cleaning up before they were ready to be harvested, and this just sort of became… a back-up plan, I suppose. I’m not quite sure who brought the animals in here.” Leia’s smile grows into something more secret, and Finn almost feels guilty for having seen it. “Han’s theory was that Threepio would sneak in here and open the skylight at night because he felt bad for the plants. I told him that it was more likely R2.”

Finn opens his mouth to say something about Han, but no words he could possibly offer would bridge the gap between Leia and her husband. She seems to have come to peace with the loss, judging by her ability to mention him without breaking down, but Finn is  _terrible_  at reading people. He can’t even imagine how broken up she must be, especially given the cause of Han’s death. Instead of re-opening the wound, he says, keeping his voice light, “I bet Rey would love this place. Do you know if she’s been in here yet?”

“No, she didn’t mention it to me before she left,” Leia shakes her head, and then looks at Finn suddenly. “Oh, that’s right-- Rey gets back today, doesn’t she?”

Finn nods, as if he hasn’t been counting the days down to her return. “If her and Chewie are keeping track of time, then yeah, she does.”

His nod clearly doesn’t fool Leia. Her eyes are shrewd despite her soft smile. “You must be very excited.”

Excited doesn’t even begin to cover the range of emotions he feels at the idea of being reunited with Rey. After the fight, it had seemed like he’d barely gotten the chance to talk to her—well, to talk to her the way he  _wanted to_ , about important things. He’s proud of her, if he’s allowed to think that; it’s not as if he’s done much to help her on her path. At the end of the day, Rey would find a way to becoming a Jedi no matter what obstacles had arisen, seeing as it’s her destiny and all that. He privately likes to think that he had a hand in it, though; and he knows Poe likes to think the same.

(They had stayed up all night last night, holding each other and talking in hushed voices about all the possibilities for the future. They hadn’t done much more than  _hold_ , although at one point Finn had been unable to help himself and kissed Poe, buzzing with frenetic affection. Poe had kissed back, but hadn’t let it progress to anything, hands slowly gliding over Finn’s body like ships. “ _Wait_ ,” he’d whispered, and Finn is still waiting, impatient heart fluttering at the idea of having both of the people he wants to kiss within arms’ reach at once.)

Leia raises an eyebrow, amused at the lack of a reply, so it’s all Finn can do to blurt out in humiliation, “Me?  _You_  must be very excited, General.” Leia’s eyebrow only arches inquisitively higher, and Finn explains, “I mean, it’s your  _brother_.”

Again, Leia’s face goes vulnerable, just as it had when she’d mentioned Han. Her smile contorts itself into something unidentifiable. “Has Luke… told you he intends on returning with Rey?”

“Yeah,” Finn says, puzzled. “I mean, no, I haven’t spoken to him, but Rey said she was going to bring him back. I mean, obviously. Wasn’t that the point?”

Leia gnaws on her bottom lip for a moment, musing on something, and then kneels without warning to start sorting through the shrub she’d been working on again. Finn watches her in bemusement, until he realizes she may have turned away to hide her face, and then tries to avert his gaze. She speaks without looking up from the plant. “Luke hasn’t talked to me at all. The only lines of communication we’ve had are Rey’s letters to you and Poe Dameron, and the official reports from the Falcon.”

Again, Finn can’t find the words to try to fix any of what Leia’s going through. “Oh.”

“I mean, I’ve kept hope as best I can, but.” Leia laughs, short and possibly false. “It’s a little hard to have faith that all the men in your life will return when none…” She drifts off, perhaps realizing Finn’s presence again, or bidding herself not to collapse. “At any rate, if Luke does return today, I’ll have your Rey to thank.”

 _My Rey_ , Finn thinks, and rather likes the shape of the words. Leia begins to move again, and her hands close around a small off-shoot of the shrub, fingers digging into the dirt. She uproots the plant smoothly, taking it and the dirt into her palms and then getting to her feet. Finn doesn’t comprehend that she’s holding the plant out to him until she clears her throat and clarifies, “Perhaps you could give her this. Poe mentioned that she’s a bit of a collector.”

“Oh,” Finn says again stupidly, and holds his hands out to take the plant. He isn’t wearing gloves of any sort, let alone gardening gloves, but the roots and dirt don’t feel unpleasant against his palms when Leia gives him the off-shoot. It’s pretty, and even though it hasn’t flowered yet Finn sees potential in the form of a dozen little buds sprouting from the stem in a few places. Rey  _is_  a collector, and he feels ashamed that he hadn’t thought of the idea of taking a present for her from here before Leia had. Maybe Poe knew her better. “I think she’ll love it.”

“It’ll need water,” Leia instructs, and she smiles again. This one looks more genuine, and Finn hopes that the momentary awkwardness between them has passed. It would be inadvisable to get on the wrong side of the General of the Resistance. “Keep it in a small pot, and if it does well, then you could maybe move it to a planter.”

“Sure,” Finn agrees, not sure where he’s going to find a small pot in a military base, even in one that allows for a secret garden. He figures he’d better get it repotted before Rey’s arrival, which could be any second now—and he hadn’t meant to come in here at all, so really he’s just been wasting time. He stands straighter, nodding in lieu of a salute. “Thank you, General.”

The woman’s tired eyes twinkle with amusement. “I do so prefer that to Princess,” she muses.

-

Since the second she took control of the Millennium Falcon, Rey has not had a moment of respite.

Her stay on the island had been everything she’d wanted and more; and yet she’d found it surprisingly hard to abandon all sense of self the way that Luke had. When she lived on Jakku she thought she knew the meaning of discipline because she had  _disciplined_  herself to eat only what she had to and save the rest. She had allowed her creativity to manifest through collecting junk rather than creating any future because it might turn out to have been a waste of time— and for someone in her position, time was both scarce and endless. She had trained herself to stay on the world, to learn the wrecks and landscapes of Jakku instead of escaping to the stars. She had had an incredibly high and shockingly low opinion of her own potential, and was thus stuck indefinitely.

On the island, with Luke, she learned her potential was boundless, but that she would have to learn her own boundaries regardless. Although she’d been an eager student, Rey had struggled with following some of Luke’s more severe ideas, which had caused tensions to arise between them both.

(Luke had not permitted Rey to fight him for the first two weeks of training, destiny be damned, which had made her feel immature and unworthy and all sorts of negative things. So naturally she’d attacked him anyway, and had had to stop when he refused to fight back on the grounds that she reminded him too much of Leia. Rey had punched him in the shoulder, because legendary hero or not, that had been plainly rude. Luke had laughed, the sound shocked out of him, and it surprised them both. Following that, they dueled just fine.)

(Luke had been curious when he’d caught her writing letters to Finn and Poe, and when she’d suggested he write something to his sister, he left the room—and didn’t return for long enough that Rey was wondering if it would be necessary to find another map. After he eventually came back, neither of them alluded to Luke’s family in any capacity for the rest of Rey’s time there.)

(Luke hadn’t believed her when she’d told him Han had died, and even though she’d read that Jedi weren’t supposed to get emotional, that night she held the most powerful remaining Jedi that was left. She rubbed his back as he bawled, and told him soft stories about Han’s final days, leaving out Ben and Kylo and Snoke and all the other nightmares that threatened to press in on the edge of her tales. When Rey had woken up in the morning, Luke had been talking to Chewie, or more accurately, petting the Wookie’s shoulder as Chewie groaned sympathetically. Rey had pretended to sleep in.)

And despite the letdown of Luke not being the perfect mentor Rey had hoped for, he was wise and experienced, and Rey could see the kindness that he’d kept in his heart since before his own adventure had even begun, so she forgave him his minor downfalls and was as patient as possible. In return, Luke had taught her how to better command the Force: how to turn all these confusing, swirling impulses running amok inside her head into palpable, wieldable things that she could see with her own two eyes.

Finally, she bested him in a fight, and he told her, panting heavily from the ground, “You are ready.” Rey tried not to smile at how proud Luke looked, and failed thoroughly. He’d smiled back.

By the time Rey began preparations to go back to D’Qar, she’d formed such a close rapport with Luke that it seemed impossible he wouldn’t want to come. Her confidence in his presence caused her to bring it up casually, and she was completely unprepared for the violence of his reaction.

“What,” she demanded, staring him down. “Are you joking?”

“I—” Luke hesitated, eyes flitting between her and Chewbacca. “My work is done—”

“ _No_ ,” Rey cut him off, not entertaining that idea for a second. “Your work is done with  _me_.  _You_  still have work to do, and people to see.”

Luke fell silent for a good while, apparently ruminating on the pros and cons of returning to society vs. living as a lonely powerful hermit, and eventually Rey persisted, “I’m not the only one who’s been missed, Master Luke.”

The image reflected in Luke’s eyes of unsettled tides and comfortable isolation, stayed with Rey for a long time, permanently painted into her memories. He opened his mouth to speak, and Rey sensed that he was about to say something she wouldn’t want to hear. She blurted out, “We’ll stay.”

Chewie let out a growl, unintelligible in any dialect but easily translated as  _confusion_ , and the heartbreaking look disappeared from Luke’s eyes. “Really?”

“Not forever. Just until I can convince you to come back with me,” Rey stated, and the determined words carried a finality that nobody could argue with.

-

They touch down on D’Qar not one day late, or two, but  _two whole weeks_.

Rey foolishly assumes that maybe, just maybe, since she had retrieved  _Luke Skywalker_ , the focus might be mostly on him and she could take a well-deserved break. But when they land on the Resistance base, the first thing she encounters is, disappointingly, not some food or a shower or her bed. She’s practically lifted up into a crowd of people, Resistance soldiers all cheering her name in a barrage of gratitude and congratulations.

“You really found him,” says a voice that might be Major Ematt’s, followed by a happy shout from Jessika Pava and a thump to Rey’s shoulder that hurts more than it should.

“Okay, alright, yes,” she’s in the middle of saying, when arms close around her, circling into a tight loop around her body. Rey would panic at the sudden embrace if she didn’t instantly recognize the smell, even after weeks of not getting a whiff of it. She lets out a tiny, happy sob, and her hands fly up to clutch at the pilot holding her. “Poe,” she whispers, weak and happy.

Poe pulls away, his grin stretched nearly ear-to-ear without its usual mischievous edge. He’s grown a beard since she left, a well-trimmed thing that only serves to somehow make him more attractive. “You’re late,” he murmurs, holding Rey as tightly as he can without hurting her. The crowd of people surrounding them fade out in Rey’s peripheral, as the only thing she’s focused on is Poe. Poe Dameron, the Resistance’s best pilot, the charmer who Rey’s certain could get  _anyone_  he wants but who has inexplicably chosen her.

Rey has not had a moment of respite for the past two months, and has barely slept a wink in the last two weeks, and even though she has learned a higher level of control under Luke than she would have ever reached on her own, she suddenly realizes how much she’s been waiting for the opportunity to do this. She rocks up onto her tippy toes and kisses Poe without warning.

He makes a soft noise against her lips, surprised and pleased (she hopes), and then leans into the kiss, lips spreading pliantly for her. It’s everything Rey imagined their reunion to be, and somehow even better.

“Hey, hey,” she hears from over Poe’s shoulder, and she actually jumps a little with delight, smile spreading against the pilot’s lips. “I thought we were waiting to kiss ’til we were all together again.”

Poe pulls away from the kiss, and glances back at Finn with his usual roguish smirk; the one that sends shivers through Rey’s knees every time she sees it. “Well, we  _are_  all together again,” he points out, and his hands slip down, settling right at the small of Rey’s back. She feels soft and small in the best kind of ways.

Finn’s smile is just as bright as Poe’s, and he moves first. Poe slides out of his way, and whereas Poe’s kiss was saccharine sweet, Finn’s kiss makes Rey want to melt into a Force-sensitive puddle.

That thought brings an unbidden laugh to Rey, and Finn laughs too, against her mouth. Poe has a hand on both of them, anchoring them to him and gripping their clothes tightly, and Rey realizes after a moment of laugh-kissing Finn that she’s also crying on him.

“I’m sorry,” she laughs and cries all at once, pulling away and reaching up to wipe at her eyes. “I’m not sad, I promise! I don’t… I just missed you both so much.”

Finn nods quickly, pressing his forehead against hers. Poe jokes, “It must be a Force thing,” and jerks his head in the direction of the Falcon.

Rey doesn’t understand, not until she follows Poe’s gesture to see what he’s indicating to. Standing on the gangway are two figures wrapped so tightly around each other it’s hard to even tell where one stops and the other ends. It takes a moment for Rey to realize she’s looking at Leia and Luke, and after that she sees what Poe’s talking about— both siblings are crying, Leia’s damp cheeks barely visible over Luke’s shaking shoulder. Poe’s arms circle back around Rey and Finn, and Rey watches the two Skywalkers hold each other, finally united after years.

Rey can’t help but notice the missing third member.

Poe and Finn must have read her mind about Han, because the two of them exchange a glance and then Poe clears his throat, drawing Rey’s attention back to him.

“Oh! Right,” Finn exclaims, and takes Rey’s hands in his. She’s struck by how much wider his fingers are, and she instinctively weaves her fingers through his, interlocking them tightly. “We want to show you our room.”

“Our room?”

-

 _Our room_ , apparently, consists of two beds, one bedside table, a wardrobe, and a door that Rey can only assume leads to another room. The wardrobe surprises her more than anything because of how out of place it looks—a dalliance from the mandated and necessary furniture that outfits the rest of the base. It’s a step up from the island, and a discomfiting step down from the familiarity of the Falcon.

She pivots on the spot to see Finn and Poe staring at her with bated breath. Finn is openly anxious, whereas Poe has a hesitant smile, but she can see the nerves clearly shining through both of their expressions.

Rey isn’t sure what to say, so she chews her lip like a child. “I hope you didn’t get the closet for me.”

“Oh, no,” Finn replies quickly. “That was for Poe.”

Taking offense, Poe shoots back, “Excuse me, I’m not the one who keeps people’s  _clothing_.” He looks at Rey, hand resting on Finn’s back as he continues. “And we didn’t know if you’d be switching to the traditional Jedi poncho, so we figured we’d leave room for whatever clothes you had.”

Rey nods awkwardly. “I don’t have any clothes.” She turns back to survey the room again. “And, um, are we missing a bed?”

Poe answers, “No, we figured this would be better. I sleep curled around Finn most nights anyway, but we thought it’d be nice to have the option of space. And if none of us are using it, we can make it a guest bed.”

Finn snorts. “What guests do you intend on having?” and Poe replies cheekily, but Rey isn’t really listening to them. Her attention has been stolen away by what appears to be a regulation cup on the otherwise bare table. The sparsely decorated room has no mess other than the cup, and it’s sitting in the very centre of the table, and maybe Rey’s Force-sensitivity has made her a powerful empath or maybe it’s just her gut but something feels sad about the lonely cup.

“What’s that for,” she asks, cutting Finn off mid-sentence. “Drinking night?”

Neither of the two laugh, and Rey drops her curious smile instantly. Poe’s hand is smoothing over Finn’s back slowly, and his eyes are blank, which frightens Rey immensely. Finn swallows, and Rey watches his throat bob as he looks down at the floor.

She crosses the room, and stands between the large and small bed, picking up the cup with interest. It’s filled with dirt, which is so unexpected she can’t even think of a proper reaction. She lets out an uncertain laugh. “Um… it’s just dirt in a cup.”

Silence presses down on all three of them. “No, it was for you,” Poe says, mostly because Finn doesn’t seem able to. “It’s from Finn—”

Finn corrects, “It’s from  _Leia_ —”

“It’s from  _Finn_  because he thought you might like something to take care of when you get back,” Poe continues, uninhibited as always. “It, uh, died a few days ago though.”

“I’m sorry, I meant to throw it out before you arrived,” Finn stammers, and Rey examines the cup again, and realizes that it’s not a cup at all, but a make-shift pot. Her hands tremble, and she sifts through the dirt. Sure enough, there are small dead brown leaves littered all throughout the soil, and the tip of her ring finger catches on a root. Rey looks up at Poe and Finn, now both looking anxious.

“I’m sorry,” Finn repeats, voice mechanic.

“If you don’t like the place you don’t have to…” Poe begins, and falls silent, searching for the right word.

Finn picks up quickly, “You don’t have to stay with us if you don’t like it. Living together is a big commitment, and we totally get it if you’re not in love with—”

“I am in love with you,” Rey interrupts fiercely, as Finn finishes with “— _the room_.”

If the silence before had pressed down on them all, this moment feels like the silence has drained all the air from the room and left them in deep space, in a new, unknowable atmosphere.

Rey puts the cup down on the table again, and folds her hands together. “I am in love with you, Finn. And you, Poe—I mean, obviously both of you, I love you both.”

Both men are staring at Rey, and her chest and neck and face are burning in embarrassment and affection, so all she can do is keep talking. “I’m sorry I came late, but I had to, and I do love the room, and our beds, and the-the fact that you both did this for me when I’ve done nothing for either of you, you got me a  _present_ , Finn, and I killed it—”

“You didn’t kill it,” Finn interjects. “I should have kept it alive for you, I just missed you so much. I didn’t know when you were coming back and I wasn’t as— as hopeful as I should have been.” He raises his chin, smiling gently. “I love you too.”

They both turn to Poe, and Rey sees with a start that there are tears in his eyes. Their mere existence practically wrenches Rey to him, and she raises a small hand to cup one of his cheeks, Finn bringing his soft palm to the other.

“I thought it was a Force thing,” she teases Poe, and he chuckles, blinking quickly.

“Guess that means I’m a Jedi, then,” Poe replies, and it breaks Rey’s heart anew to hear him all choked up. She leans in and kisses his cheek where her hand had been, and Finn mimics her. Poe’s arms snake around both of them, pulling them close; this time, he anchors himself to their warmth.

They stand there in the doorway for a beat too long, the moment dragging on into a minute as Poe stops crying and Rey becomes aware of his breathing. Finn’s wide eyes blink open and he moves his kiss from Poe’s cheek to the corner of his mouth, and tugs him into a kiss effortlessly from there.

Rey pulls back only enough to watch, and a different kind of warm affection awakens inside her. “You two have done that before,” she accuses, interest piqued.

“Mm, not as much as I’d like,” Poe says, his voice more level. His hand rests in the small of Rey’s back where it had earlier, and then slowly drifts down. “We’ve been waiting for you.”

Rey gasps, and Finn pulls them all towards the bed, tumbling gracefully down onto the covers.

-

Thump.

 _Thump_.

 ** _Thump_**.

“Ah,  _shit_ ,” Poe says, raising his head from between Rey’s legs. His head is practically spinning, his lips are parted wide, and Rey’s going to have beard burn all over her tomorrow morning if they don’t get some  _spectacularly_ effective lotion for her before they sleep tonight.

Finn pulls away from Rey’s kiss, his lips also wet. “What’s wrong?”

Rey’s eyes open before Poe can answer, the Force alerting her exactly what’s wrong. “He forgot to let BB-8 in.”

Finn lets out a groan, which turns into a moan as Rey’s fingers do something unprecedented but well-received. “Oh,  _oh_ —ah, okay, go quickly.”

Poe looks to Rey for approval, and she nods. Her hair is a mess, one bun having dissolved completely and the other two looking awfully disheveled. She’s practically glowing all over, and her eyes are darker than Poe’s ever seen them before.

“BB can wait,” he decides, and leans back down.

**Author's Note:**

> This was my first gift exchange ever, and I had a great time writing this! My original idea for the prompt turned into a quick drabble that was barely 1000 words, and didn’t feel like I’d put enough effort into it at all. I’m much happier with this one, and I hope you enjoy it as well, even though it’s not exactly what the prompt asked for!
> 
> (Crossposted to [here](http://swgiftexchange.tumblr.com/post/141854972347/best-of-buds-reyfinnpoe) on tumblr.)


End file.
